


A Strongly Worded Note

by Woland



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Airfield scene AU, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley Whump (Good Omens), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, FebuWhump2021, Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, THE CHARACTER DEATH IS TEMPORARY, but they are too emotionally constipated, but we do eventually end with some fluff, provided all goes well of course, so it takes one of them nearly dying to admit to such horrid things like feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-15 11:07:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29188278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woland/pseuds/Woland
Summary: What if the airfield scene went a little differently? What if Satan was angry enough at the traitor to want to punish him right then and there?
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 56
Kudos: 162





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I got this little whump idea a while ago, and then I saw the febuwhump prompts and thought "ooh, those fit perfectly". So, here I am. :)
> 
> Prompt for chapter 1: Impaling

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no!”

Satan rears backwards in agony, His monstrous, Hellfire-singed features already beginning to dissolve in the mist-thick air, succumbing to Adam’s will. And then those terrifying, soulless eyes seek out Crowley and the blackness in them sharpens, swirls with glowing hatred.

“Traitor,” he growls, teeth bared, and waves his enormous clawed hand in his direction, releasing forth a ball of swirling black mass that thickens and stretches, morphing into an enormous stake-like projectile that zooms toward the demon even as the hand itself dissipates into thin wisps of black smoke along with its owner.

And Crowley doesn’t have time to move, doesn’t even have time to flinch before Satan’s parting weapon buries itself deep in his chest. He gasps, staggering backwards under the force of it. Presses a trembling hand against the burning weight of the stake, gulping frantically for air he doesn’t technically need. But it feels thick all of a sudden, suffocating – like being thrown into the sulfur pits once more when there was nothing to breathe in but the smell of his own burning flesh. The airfield wavers and dips unsteadily, the picture becoming alarmingly blurred, straining his rapidly dwindling senses. _Fuck_ , he thinks eloquently. _Aw, fuck…_

“Crowley?”

He sways inelegantly toward the familiar, worry-tinged voice, blinks rapidly against the encroaching fog.

“H-hey, angel,” he addresses the cream-colored blob that slowly, almost reluctantly comes into focus.

His corporation’s failing him, coming apart at the seams even as his true form is starting to break down under the onslaught of Satan’s wrath that the weapon is seeped in. But Crowley is nothing if not stubborn, and he’ll go out on his own time when he’s good and ready, thank you very much. Which means his bloody corporation and his dying self are just going to fucking have to wait. Just a little bit. Until he’s ready.

“Crowley, what….” Aziraphale takes a step toward him, blue eyes wide with confusion and fear as they take in the source of pulsating agony in the center of Crowley’s chest before shifting up to seek Crowley’s gaze. “What is this?”

“Oh, this?” Crowley waves casually at the protruding stake, the gesture almost undoing his precarious balance, forcing him to compensate by setting his trembling legs wider to gain support. “S’nothing, angel. I think the… the big Bosssss’s dissssapointed ‘n my performancssse. Ssss’my sssstrongly worded note.” He squeezes out a drunkenly crooked smile, trying for cool and nonchalant and missing by a mile. Especially once his corporation’s legs finally decide that they’ve had enough of his bluster and fold underneath him despite his best efforts to the contrary.

Aziraphale doesn’t seem to appreciate the joke. Or Crowley’s rather graceless swoon for that matter. Because Crowley suddenly finds himself laid out on the damp tarmac, his head cradled with unexpected gentleness in the angel’s lap, and Aziraphale himself is leaning over him with the most concerningly devastated expression on his face.

And Crowley’s tired brain stutters for a moment, just trying to parse the meaning of it all. Because this is new for the two of them, too raw, too open, too… too _soft_ , for Someone’s sake. This is… _emotions_! And they’ve never done emotions before. Well, Aziraphale hasn’t, unless you count him yelling at Crowley over one thing or another. Crowley doesn’t… doesn’t know what to do with this new thing, how to make sense of it. It makes him uncomfortable, especially that inexplicably heartbroken expression on his angel’s face. Makes him want to reach out and wipe it away.

He tries to do just that, in fact. Strains his indefensibly weak, leaden arm to lift it up off the ground so he can touch his angel’s cheek.

And ends up smacking it against Aziraphale’s own hand instead when the angel makes the mistake of reaching for the blackened stake embedded in his chest.

“D-don’t,” he gasps, wrapping his trembling fingers around Aziraphale’s wrist and digging his claws in for good measure, lest the stupid angel should fight him on this. “Ssssatan’s weapon. It’ll kill you.”

“Well, it’s killing _you_ right now!”

There’s frantic despair in the angel’s voice, a look of wretched, tearful agony on his face that Crowley’s never seen before. Certainly not on _his_ account. It is unsettlingly and terrifyingly… nice. 

Still, Crowley’s a demon, albeit a dying one. And no proper, self-respecting demon would be caught dead with someone (especially an angel) being _nice_ to them. And since Crowley is, quite literally, about to be caught dead in just such a predicament, he falls back on the only thing he knows to be perfectly effective at snapping the angel out of whatever weird mood he’s in.

Snark.

He releases Aziraphale’s wrist, letting his hand flop boneless back to the ground. Gives the angel his best insolent smile he can force his numb lips into. “S’alright though,” he slurs, noting with a pang of regret that the angel’s features are already starting to dissolve before him despite his best efforts, “y-you don’t ev’n l…like me.”

There’s an odd tremble in response in the arms that hold him, and he thinks he hears someone crying, hears his name being called. And he tries to hang on just a little longer, tries to understand what’s going on. _Just a little more_ , he thinks. He can’t go yet, he isn’t ready.

Darkness comes for him all the same.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, this went in the dirEcTioN I wanted it to go, but it also took a completely different (and much longer) route than I had originally intended, and I had to restrain the muse to pull her back into the proper lane. So.... Keeping in mind that this was meant to be a drabble with ostensibly very little plot, here goes the rest of this mess.

_“I’m afraid I rather made a mess of things.”_

That’s what he’d said to Crowley a few hours earlier. His own words. 

_A mess of things._

How stupidly, how pathetically inadequate.

No, this wasn’t a mess. This was Armageddon. His very own, personal Armageddon. The end of his personal world.

He felt it, too, as real as anything. The way the earth shattered under his feet when he saw that awful blackened thing sticking out of Crowley’s chest. The way the light dimmed when he watched Crowley stagger and fall. The way the air turned to scorching fire in his corporation’s lungs when those pain-whitened lips parted to echo the single most shameful, damning lie to ever come out of Aziraphale’s own mouth.

“I didn’t mean it,” he cries out, even as Crowley’s eyes slip closed and the demon’s rigid, agony-racked frame sags boneless in his arms. “I didn’t mean it, Crowley, _please_!”

He grips the demon’s shoulders, shaking him as panic roars within him, wild and ferocious like the fires of Hell. He can’t lose him! Not now. Not like this. They have come so far… Please…

But Crowley remains deaf to his pleas, his head lolling lifelessly with the frantic motion, flopping backwards to reveal the long, vulnerable line of his neck. Crowley is dying. Slipping away from him with every passing second. He can feel it. Can feel the threads of his demonic essence growing weaker, fraying, breaking, unraveling…. And Aziraphale cannot breathe, he cannot breathe, he cannot _think_!

He screams – raucous and high-pitched and wild, his wings snapping open behind him as his angelic essence keens in mounting despair. Gathers Crowley closer, withdraws one hand from the demon’s shoulders to let it hover over the blackened stake sticking out of his friend’s chest. He can feel the awful, searing heat coming off the weapon, can feel its hateful, ravenous hunger as it eats away at Crowley’s True Form, insatiable until it consumes him whole. 

Aziraphale won’t let that happen. He won’t. If he could just….

He brings his hand closer, steeling himself for the inevitable burning pain.

“You shouldn’t do that,” a child’s voice admonishes, and Aziraphale finds his hand once again stayed by a surprisingly strong grip, inches away from its goal. “Your demon friend is right.” The Antichrist tells him, gesturing with his free hand at the limp body between them. “This thing is too dark and too hungry. It will burn you up.”

“I don’t care,” Aziraphale insists, his voice – a near roar as he struggles to control his Grace that pulsates and beats against his essence, flaring brighter with impossible urgency. “I have to take it out, Adam. It’s killing him, can’t you see that! I have to take it out so I can heal him!”

Adam cocks his head to one side, his wide blue eyes – both naïve and old, almost as old as Creation itself – contemplating him with grave childlike earnestness. Then he nods and, still keeping Aziraphale’s hand hostage, reaches with his other one to pull the stake out. The stake slips free with a sickening squelch, long, tentacle-like wisps of inky-black smoke trailing after it, flailing wildly in the air as if in anger at the sudden loss of their host.

“There,” he says, casually tossing the weapon aside. “Can you heal him now?”

Aziraphale doesn’t waste time on words of gratitude. There’ll be plenty of that later, he hopes. He shifts his attention instantly back to Crowley, bringing his (now free) hand to the smoldering gaping hole in the center of the demon’s chest, channels all of his Grace and all of his power, and he prays.

***

“Crowley.”

There’s a gentle brush of fingers against the side of his face, a tingle of what almost feels like Grace against his skin.

“Could you open your eyes for me, dear?”

He knows that touch, knows that voice. And it’s strange, he thinks, that he should be able to sense any of it. He’d died, hadn’t he? This isn’t… _can’t be_ right. Still, he could never refuse a request from that voice. Especially not when it sounds like… well, like _that –_ all pleading and tearful and… and… _wrong_. The response was purely Pavlovian now.

He opens his eyes.

And fights the urge to close them right back up again. Because there’s an angel-looking creature leaning over him, a brightly glowing angel that looks just like Aziraphale, with eyes like sparkling sapphires, a smile that threatens to split its face in two, and an expression of such overall fondness that for a moment Crowley feels frozen under the sheer intensity of it.

In the very next moment he’s scrambling frantically away.

“Crowley?”

The angel thing sounds confused now and worried and so, _so_ like _his_ angel. But Crowley knows better. Crowley’s been around for millennia. He’s the original tempter, the trickster, the manipulator. You can’t fool him with some cheap Hell-borne trickery, no sirree.

He doesn’t know _exactly_ where he is, doesn’t know _exactly_ what type of infernal purgatory awaits defunct demons. It’s not like there was an instructions manual for that type of thing in Hell. Just the rumors, the whispers, the tall tales. 

But he does know where he is _not_ , and that is _definitely_ _not_ on the misty rain-slick tarmac of the thrice-blessed Tadfield airfield. And the angel and the humans standing around him in a wide circle are no more real than the wavering ground underneath his trembling legs. It’s a hallucination, nothing more. A cruel trick that Satan’s playing on him to lull him into a false sense of security. But Crowley knows better. Oh yes! Any moment now those benevolent disguises of fake concern will melt away to reveal the hideous rot-ridden faces of his eternal torturers.

“Crowley.”

The non-angel takes a step in his direction, right hand held out toward him in a beseeching gesture. And, bless him, the bastard even replicated his angel’s pinky ring. Everything down to the very last detail. Pulled down all the stops, did they.

“Stay back!” he warns, staggering drunkenly out of range, turning his back on the expression of hurt confusion on the angel-thing’s face. Twists around so he can see the faces of all the other imposters around him. He’s aware that he’s making a scene, that he probably looks like a wild caged animal, but he can’t be too careful, can’t turn his back on any of them for too long. They’re just waiting for him to let his guard down so they could pounce. “All of you, whoever the Heaven you are, stay back!”

“Whoever we are?” The creature posing as one of the humans – the Book Girl – tilts its head to the side, squinting at him from behind its round glasses. “Who do you _think_ we are?”

So that’s how it’s gonna be, is it _._ Playing games with him, are they. Gonna make him _guess_ who his torturers are. 

“I don’t give a blessed fuck what you lot look like,” he snarls, all of his teeth on full display. “You’re gonna show me your real faces soon enough.”

“Crowley….” The angel-thing twists his hands in front of him in a gesture so starkly reminiscent of the real Aziraphale that it sears through Crowley like a blessed knife in the gut. “…I don’t know what it is you _think_ you’re seeing, but I can assure you we are all quite real.”

“Right.” He snorts, lips twisted with derision. “Real, sure.” How stupid do these creatures think he is? “You wanna keep up the charade? Tell me I’m not actually dead now?”

“But you aren’t, Crowley!”

The angel-thing takes another step in his direction, and Crowley retreats from it with a warning hiss. The creature’s face falls, blue eyes dimming with defeat. For some reason even now it makes him uncomfortable, makes him want to do something to fix it.

He squashes that impulse down. He knows better. Any minute now the illusion will be broken and all he’ll know from then on will be pain, pain, pain.

“He’s right, you know. You’re not _actually_ dead.”

Scoffing, he turns toward the creature posing as the little human boy wearing too large glasses. Opens his mouth to tell him off, when the little girl creature standing next to him chimes in.

“It’s true. Your angel friend threw such a huge fit when he thought you were dying, Adam had to help him fix you.”

“A fit.” Crowley blinks at it slowly.

“Oh yeah,” the girl creature confirms with a self-satisfied nod. “Was wailing over you so loud it was embarrassing. Even had his wings out and everything.”

“It was wicked,” the Antichrist-looking creature confirms with a gleeful spark in its eyes.

Crowley’s had enough.

“Look, I appreciate the theatricals. A+ on the performance all around, really. But show’s over, alright. M’tired. Let’s just get on with whatever it is you were planning to do to me.”

The children creatures stare up at him, wearing matching frowns of confusion.

“We’re not–”

“You overplayed it, alright?” he snaps, cutting off the girl creature with a dramatic hand flail. Stalks closer, snarling into their bemused little faces, “I’m a _demon_. And Aziraphale, the _real_ Aziraphale, never once let me forget that. We were never friends as far as he was concerned. We were never even colleagues. We were on opposite ssssides. And you’re trying to tell me that he _cried_ over me? That he was so distraught over my death he lost control of his True Form in front of a bunch of humans?” He laughs, loud and angry and bitter. “You really think me that big of a fool to believe such rubbish?” 

“I really have hurt you a great deal, haven’t I, dear.”

He stiffens at the unmistakable sorrow that laces the quiet words. Turns back, squinting apprehensively at the angel-thing. It doesn’t attempt to come closer anymore. Stands where it was, wringing its hands just like the angel used to do whenever he was nervous or upset.

“I’ve pushed you back for so long,” it says, watching Crowley with those big blue eyes, and Crowley reads sadness there and anguish and… _guilt_? “I… said things to you… hurtful things, untrue things. Said them so often, so… callously. How can I blame you for believing them? All this time I thought I was protecting you, protecting _us_. But I was being a coward, wasn’t I. Hiding behind Heaven’s rules and hurting the one person I….”

It trails off, a trembling hand pressed against its mouth as its eyes brim with tears. Remorse and sorrow are radiating off the creature in waves so powerful that Crowley shuffles back a step just to avoid being overwhelmed by them. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen a demon cry – not the ones that spend all their lives Below, at least. Doesn’t think they’re even capable of it. If this truly is an illusion, this is the most shocking one he’s experienced so far.

“You should kiss ‘im.”

Check that.

“Pardon?” the angel-thing squeaks in response, turning its now very confused and quite panicked eyes toward the Antichrist creature.

And, yeah, Crowley can totally understand the panic bit. Because that proposal came so far out of the left field that it would knock anybody senseless, demon or not. Crowley, for his part, feels like he’d just been hit over the head with a cast-iron skillet.

And the Antichrist creature is apparently not done swinging.

“It’s what adults do in all the movies and books and stuff.” It gives the angel-thing a very solemn, very determined look. “You want to convince him of your true feelings, you gotta kiss ‘im. True love’s kiss – works every time.”

Beside it the girl creature rolls its eyes with an expression of inexplicable disappointment.

The angel-thing dithers some more, pressing its tightly clasped hands against its chest. Its gaze flits over to Crowley, hesitant and fearful and… hopeful? And then it shakes itself, squares its shoulders and starts toward Crowley with a look of such determination that Crowley unconsciously stumbles back a step. 

The angel-thing stops right in front of him, raises its hands, placing them on either side of Crowley’s face. And this is it, Crowley thinks, the jig is definitely up now. And so he braces himself for the inevitable. For the illusion to shatter, for the mask to fall away, for sharp talons to pierce his flesh and infernal fire to lick his skin….

The hands on his cheeks tremble a little but remain gentle, warm. And Crowley’s very essence trembles in response to that warmth – a sudden potent need to be closer to it threatening to override his sense of self-preservation. 

“I’m afraid I’ve never quite gotten the hang of this particular human tradition,” the angel-thing whispers, blue eyes staring into Crowley’s, wide and uncertain, as if asking for permission, “but I do believe our little Hellspawn has a point. So I’m going to try my best.”

And then it leans its face forward and crashes its lips upon Crowley’s.

_Not a demon_ , Crowley’s brain registers numbly as Grace, undeniably angelic Grace floods his senses. _Aziraphale_ , his brain ekes out next, sputtering and shorting, as tendrils of that _familiar, familiar, familiar_ warmth twist and worm their way through him, lighting the core of him on fire. And then his brain stops working altogether.

“I need you to believe me, Crowley. I need you to believe that this is real.” The angel, his angel, _his angel_ , oh dear G… Sat… Somebody!..., pulls away, breaking the kiss. Watches Crowley intently, waiting for his response.

But Crowley can’t respond. Crowley’s throat is dry as the desert sand, and his lips are numb and tingly, and his brain is hopelessly stunned.

“I like you, Crowley,” the angel whispers, those blue-blue eyes holding his gaze, pinning him down like a butterfly, exposed and flayed. “I… _more_ than like you…. I’ve more than liked you for many, many years now. But I’ve been a coward, and I’ve been cruel… so very cruel to you, my dear. I thought… well, somehow, I thought that we’d have time… that _I’d_ have time to… to tell you how I feel, to… to explain. And then I… I nearly lost you and….”

The angel blinks and the tears that swim in his eyes spill over the edges, trailing down the pale cheeks. And Crowley wants to reach up, to wipe them away, but his arms feel like overcooked noodles and it’s taking what little concentration his poor, short-circuited brain has left just to remain standing.

“It was the worst moment of my life, Crowley. Not just the fear of losing you, but the thought of you dying and believing you matter so very little to me. I… I mean to change that. I mean to be braver.” He smiles shakily, brushing the pad of his thumb along Crowley’s cheekbone. “I mean to show you how I feel about you every day for all the years that you and I have left in this world.” He moves in closer once more. “And beg your forgiveness for all the years that I have failed.”

His lips capture Crowley’s again, flooding the demon with wave after wave of regret and devotion and love, love, _love_.

Crowley’s brain checks out completely, his legs folding at the knees like a thumb push puppet. The angel’s arms wrap around him, strong and sure, two enormous white wings snapping open to cocoon him in their downy warmth, hiding his unbecoming weakness from prying eyes.

“Shall we move this somewhere more comfortable, darling?” Aziraphale murmurs, a fond smile creasing the corners of his eyes. Then it falls, his brow furrowing, distraught. “Oh, but the bookshop, it’s… it’s gone, isn’t it.”

Crowley blinks, works his jaw, desperately trying to force his mouth to do his bidding. _“We can go to my place if you like,”_ he means to say. It comes out as an unintelligible jumble of consonants and grunts.

Aziraphale’s answering beaming smile tells him he was understood all the same.

**Author's Note:**

> Before you yell at me, please look at the tags. :) I'm not *that* cruel. (well, sometimes I am, but not in this case, I promise). But do feel free to scream a little bit. I'd love to hear your thoughts :)  
> And be on the lookout for chapter 2. The prompt there will be "I didn't mean it".


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